Meet the WSC2007 Albert Vidal Award winner

The taste of success

Nicolas Drouin, Cooking

At fourteen years of age, Nicolas Drouin started to work as a dishwasher at the Saint-Amour restaurant of Québec, Canada, one of the great tables of the  "Vieille Capitale". "It gave me a taste for it," as he said.

Today, Nicolas is part of a team of chefs in the same restaurant where he worked 2 days a week in preparation for the 2007 WorldSkills Competition in Shizuoka, Japan. In his free days, he went to the Cooking Lab of Hydro-Québec de l'École hôtelière under the attentive supervision of Marlène Gagnon, his coach, and other chefs from this school who are accustomed to training champions.

Nicolas chose to participate in this contest for the challenge and also to surpass himself in his work. According to him his strengths are his workmanship and his attention to detail. He is very quick and in control of what he does.

Finally all the efforts and preparation of this young man of 20 years of age have delivered the fruits of his labour. As a matter of fact, Nicolas is coming back from Japan with his hands full. Not only did he win the gold medal in Cooking, but he was also awarded the prize of the Best of Nation for Canada. More over, Nicolas was recognized with the Albert Vidal Award for the best score amongst all Competitors in all skill categories from all countries/regions.